


What They Seem

by PoliticallyObsessedScholar



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: M/M, au from Christmas of Sixth Year, this wasn't going to be Drarry but then they refused not to end up together
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-11-27
Updated: 2016-11-27
Packaged: 2018-09-02 15:06:04
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Rape/Non-Con
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,593
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8672071
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/PoliticallyObsessedScholar/pseuds/PoliticallyObsessedScholar
Summary: Harry Potter knows the dicotomy of Good and Evil. He also knows exactly where everyone around him falls on that spectrum. So when he's captured by Death Eaters, he's surprised to find out that's not quite true.





	

As he was being dragged by two death eaters to the centre of a cavernous room, Harry thought he'd been monumentally stupid. He  _knew_ that Voldemort had a plan in the offing, he  _knew_ , that Malfoy was involved, he  _knew_ that now that the war had begun in earnest nowhere was safe for him. So of course he'd accepted Hermione's invitation to spend the Christmas break with her in muggle Britain. Why not?

On the Christmas train, a train he'd never had the opportunity to ride before in all his time at Hogwarts, they'd been ignored by a jealous and angry Ron. Ginny had followed her brother out of their compartment and he and Hermione had been left with Luna and Neville to keep them company. As he passed a compartment on his way back from the bathroom, Harry thought he caught a glimpse of Draco Malfoy looking pale as death. He'd been surrounded by other Slytherins, jeering and mocking. One of them, it could have been Nott, was making lewd gestures with his hands and body while the others laughed. Malfoy hadn't joined in, instead he'd abruptly stood up and left the compartment to another round of laughter. 

It was certainly odd, he wasn't quite sure how it fit in with his earlier suspicion that Malfoy had been up to something, that he was a perfectly cheerful Death Eater. He'd spent the rest of the train ride expounding on this fact to the general annoyance of his friends. As they'd arrived in London, Hermione threatened him with painful consequences should he waste any more of her holiday talking about Draco bloody Malfoy. So he'd shut up, walked over to the smiling Grangers' and spent a glorious few days exploring the muggle world. He'd never been to the cinema, never gone to York, never seen the inside of a Cathedral. Hermione lived in Sheffield with her parents and she'd taken to the role of tour guide like a duck to water. She took him out to the Peaks and shown him the Waterstones in the city centre (her favourite store, obviously) and then, to his surprise, she'd decided to buy him some clothes.

He had never been happier.

Things went south when they snuck out to Centertainment and had found it in the middle of a Death Eater attack. He'd managed to throw his invisibility cloak over his friend just before his arms were grabbed and he was apparated to his current location.

"My Lord!" cried the one holding his left arm "We have brought you Potter!"

That this was completely unexpected was obvious and Harry took the time afforded him by their self-flattering description of his capture to try and find a way out. He couldn't see one. Along the far wall of the cave, right in the centre, was a throne on which was seated the Dark Lord. He was surrounded by a semi-circle of masked and hooded figures. There were flickering lanterns on the walls and when he was chained with honest-to-Merlin manacles Harry couldn't help rolling his eyes. Lord Voldemort had a touch of the melodramatic about him - between this, the alter in the graveyard during fourth year, and his _branding_ there could be no doubt. He was going to die but he was fairly sure it was going to be both unreasonably painful and stylistically pleasing. It could not be anything else.

Voldemort was standing, addressing his followers, smirking at Harry but he rather found he couldn't be bothered to listen. Which made it rather a shock when everything went suddenly black.

***

He was alive. That was a unexpected. He'd been so sure that he'd been killed and surprisingly efficiently at that. As he sat up, holding a hand to his throbbing head, he was also surprised to find himself in what appeared to be a living room. He was nestled in a large bay window looking out over the Lake District, but the rest of the room was filled with bookshelves a couple of comfortable looking couches and a coffee table. There were two doors leading to other parts of the building, one in the far right corner and one in the left. They were rather well concealed. If he hadn't been looking, he would have thought he was in a completely self-contained room. Directly opposite the bay window was a wall to wall fireplace.

What on earth was he doing here?

Unexpectedly he heard the creak of the door on the left hand side and Draco Malfoy walked into the room. His hair was damp but Harry didn't give it much thought, lunging at him.

"You little fucker! I knew you were up to something, what are you? Some kind of warden? What the hell's going on here?"

His hands were around Malfoy's throat, the boy was pressed to the floor. Something like fear was flickering over his face as he raised his arms ineffectually to beat Harry off. When the haze around Harry's mind cleared he realised that he should perhaps release his hands from the other boy's neck or he wouldn't be able to answer. He did so and watched with disgust as Malfoy rubbed at his throat. 

"I'm as much a prisoner as you are  _Potter"_

Harry couldn't help a snort of laughter escaping at that

"Try again Malfoy, I know your father's one of them. I know what you're like. What are you doing here?"

Again Malfoy tried to tell him he was a prisoner. He made up some cockamamie story about how his father was in disgrace and he'd been given a suicide mission to complete within the first semester at Hogwarts. How even though he'd bragged to his friends about his glorious plan on the train he couldn't bring himself even to start planning. Obviously the Dark Lord had spies at Hogwarts and his lacklustre enthusiasm had filtered back and a new punishment had been decided on. 

"...which is why I'm here Potter. Because I'm a failure, because I'm not who you think I am. Oh all Slytherins are evil, and just because my Father is a Death Eater doesn't mean I'm one. I suppose I'm lucky he didn't decide to threaten me with my parent's lives. I would have at least tried then."

Harry arranged his face into Hermione's patented  _you don't honestly expect me to believe that, do you?_ expression and backed away with disgust. 

"Fine, don't tell me then, but I'm watching you"

He'd walked over to open the door on the right, to see where it led, but was stopped by Malfoy's cry that he "mustn't, Potter you mustn't!" which really didn't help his case. To think Malfoy was trying to make him believe he wasn't his prison guard. Pull the other one, it has bells on.

***

Harry spent the rest of the day seated in the large bay window looking outside. Malfoy was curled up in an armchair, reading one of the many books on the wall. As night fell he started to get increasingly agitated. At times Harry saw the other boy looking almost sick, not turning a page. When it was completely dark, he simply remained where he was and stared obsessively at the fireplace.

Eventually he seemed to pluck up his courage to speak.

"Potter... if He comes. If He decides that... you need to..."

"I'm not listening to a word out of your mouth, Malfoy" he interrupted he didn't know where that stuttering mess of a thought was going and he didn't particularly care

"You don't understand! I'm trying to help, I -"

The lie Malfoy was about to tell him went unsaid as the floo turned green and the tall visage of Voldemort stepped out. 

The man was smiling, which was rather unnerving. He walked towards where Malfoy was seated and the blonde boy shrank back. This seemed to amuse him further and he turned to Harry to speak, grabbing Malfoy by the arm and pulling him up.

"I have decided to be generous. I have decided to spare you my attentions tonight, so that you can prepare yourself properly"

With that rather strange pronouncement he pulled a struggling Malfoy to the right hand door, pushed him through it, and closed it behind him. 

Harry would have thought that this was all an elaborate game of good-cop, bad-cop to make him more sympathetic to Malfoy, and that the Slytherin was at this moment reporting on him to Voldemort, if it weren't for the begging.

As much as he tried, he couldn't stop hearing Malfoy beg _please_   _not again_ and Voldemorts' voice saying  _surely you didn't think that was all? you're mine now._

Then there was the screaming, the sound of flesh hitting flesh. Thumps and bumps and hysterical sobbing mixed in with laughter.

The worst was when all he could hear was a small terrified voice saying  _no no no no no_ over and over again before cutting off in a scream of such grief and pain that for a moment Harry thought he was hearing a banshee. When moans and groans started to join in, sounds that Harry knew came only from one kind of activity, everything coalesced into one excruciatingly clear picture.

Bolting for the left hand door, he flung it open to reveal a bathroom, and dry-heaved into the toilet. 

***

The next day food appeared on the coffee-table in the center of the room and Harry started to eat. When Malfoy - no Draco - stumbled out of the door on the left he was barely recognisable. There were bruises on his cheekbones and arms, his wrists were scratched and Harry thought he saw droplets of blood. Draco's lips were swollen, but they were also split slightly open. He was limping and his face had no colour. When he went to sit down, he did so gingerly. Once the other boy was comfortable, Harry cleared his throat.

He thought he was going to apologise for what happened, say he should have believed his classmate, but the glare levelled at him when Draco looked up told him that any attempt to do so would not be met with any sort of civility. In fact, he rather suspected that should he try he would be physically attacked.

"Tea!" he burst out with instead, leading to an amused quirk of Draco's eyebrow "Do you want tea? Or, I think there's coffee?"

When the request for coffee came Harry poured it, passed the cup over to Draco, sat down and said with a sigh

"And to think you call yourself British!"

At that he was rewarded with a curious look. He shook his head in mock sorrow

"Ignoring perfectly good tea for that disgusting brew. We are not amused"

The laughter when it came after a moment's pause was halting, uncertain and confused but it was there. Draco's demand for an explanation of Harry's haughty tone and last four words had led to a rather long conversation about muggle history.

Harry didn't know much, but what he did know fascinated Draco. The other boy said he'd already been declared a blood traitor by his family for opposing Voldemort. He thought he might as well go the whole nine-yards (well he'd used some strange idiom about throwing swords into lakes but Harry knew what he meant).

They'd sat in a comfortable silence until Draco asked what had happened to "that know-it all mudblood, Granger." They'd descended into a screaming match with Harry declaring that he should have known Draco couldn't change and how did he know that last- night wasn't all fake. ("I should have known, Leopards can't change their spots!" "I don't know what the fuck leopards are but you're a self-righteous, sanctimonious fuckwit, take your coffee and shove it!")

For the rest of the day they sat in distinctly uncomfortable silence.

When the floo turned green again, it was Harry's turn. He was dragged through the right hand door and into a luxurious bedroom. There was a four-poster bed with a silk canopy. Candles were floating lazily around and there was a charm that cooled the air. He was fighting, kicking and screaming. Biting and scratching at the man behind him but nothing helped. In fact for the most part it seemed to amuse Voldemort. All too soon he was lying naked on his back on the softest bed he'd ever experienced. With the last of his energy he tried to roll away but he was pulled back to the middle. He looked up to see red eyes and a smile

"To think, the Boy-Who-Lived. Here, for my pleasure," then he leaned forward and whispered in Harry's ear "you're going to wish I killed you" and descended on him.

***

The next morning it was Harry's turn for the awkward limping and settling. The warning glare and offered drink. 

The day after it was Draco.

Surprisingly quickly they settled into a routine. They were still sniping. Sarcastic quips no longer meant to seriously hurt the other boy, simply a way to state categorically that they were still there despite everything. One particularly glorious day they'd accidentally gotten a bottle of wine with their food and they'd spent it drunk and mocking every aspect of Voldemorts' appearance, especially his genitalia.

"Wait.. wait! I have a marvellous idea!" cried Draco laughing so hard tears nearly came out of his eyes "Let's... let's... oh Merlin. Look, we're never going to fight him off, but that's not the point. We both know that's not the point. Let's make it a game!"

Harry had been intrigued and listened and agreed. Which was how they started to have a competition about how many times as they struggled before and during their rapes they could hurt or otherwise inconvenience their captor. 

For a while Draco was winning with a particularly fortuitous kick to the nether regions as Voldemort positioned himself. It was, Harry had been assured, completely pointless and the rape had been more violent after that but his face had made it all worth it.

In the interests of seeing this face, Harry had managed to make himself throw up mid-fuck and had promptly placed himself in the lead.

At one point, Voldemort had appeared and said that the Malfoy family was forgiven. That Draco's punishment was over. A decision which had changed remarkably quickly after Draco started screaming that he'd rather be fucked every night for the rest of his life than join the Death Eaters.

As winter cleared and the trees outside started to blossom, Harry and Draco started to share more and more stories about their past. About their upbringings and their friendships. Harry learned that despite everything, even as all the Death Eater children were being alerted to how Draco was going to be punished, Pansy Parkinson had snuck him chocolate and books. Draco learned about how Hermione had called the police about the Dursley's, even though it hadn't worked. Harry heard about the fact that Crabbe and Goyle were loyal to Draco and excellent at creative spells. Draco heard about Ron's prodigious talent at chess.

They grew closer.

One night Draco told Harry about the plan to let the Death Eaters into Hogwarts and kill Dumbledore.

The next night Harry whispered to Draco about the prophecy, the Horcruxes Voldemort had made and how he hoped Dumbledore destroyed them.

Draco told Harry he thought the prophecy had already been fulfilled. He had, after all, mysteriously caused Voldemort to disappear for around a decade.

The resulting confusion about how exactly he'd done that had caused a flurry of research through the books in their living room.

Then after a particularly violent session, during which Harry had been chocked till he blacked out and had been left limp and immobile in the bedroom Harry whispered that he thought he'd been made into an accidental horcrux.

Draco had sat up and made him tell him why and Harry said he didn't think he was anymore. That one minute he'd been on the bed, feeling Voldemort move inside him, struggling for breath, his vision sparking, his throat being squeezed and the next he'd been standing at the gates of Hogwarts.

He'd been met unexpectedly by his mother who'd embraced him and told him how proud she was. About how he was a very brave boy and that she was so sorry she hadn't been there to protect him. There'd been a wailing, malformed, blob just out of reach and he'd stared fascinated until she'd told him that it was an evil thing, that he shouldn't touch it. That he'd technically died but since there were two souls in him, he could make the choice to return if he wished.

(He didn't tell Draco how she'd held him close, and told him about how she fell in love with his father. About how she'd seen him one day helping a group of third years with transfiguration and for the first time he hadn't seemed arrogant or entitled. About he saw him a few days later, helping a nervous first year fly. About the way she'd seen him talk animatedly with Professor Vector about Arithmancy one Saturday and she realised he was more than she thought he was. 

She told him about the way he'd started to court her, had brought her a flower he'd grown in Herbology first, then a book on charms he'd bought in Hogsmede, and more gifts as time went on. How he'd complimented her brain and not her beauty. How he'd snuck her out one crisp autumn night for a waltz under the stars. She'd told him that yes he'd been a bully but that he'd grown up and fought in a war that he could have avoided because of his blood. She told him about the fights they had and the way they always came back together to talk about it. She told him about his childhood before the Dursleys, about the way he'd laughed and James had given him piggy-back rides. That she'd used blood magic and spells known only to the Potter family to protect him the night he was killed, she thought that it was the combination of Halloween, her death to protect him, James' death to protect them, Harry's accidental magic, and those protective magics that caused Voldemort's spell to rebound. She told him to always know that they loved him very much.)

He'd decided he had so much left to do in life, there was still the chance for  _more_ and he'd returned. Draco agreed that the only way he could have two souls was if he had been an horcrux and if he stopped dreaming Voldemort's life then there might be some truth to it. 

Winter had come again before things changed. They'd been standing at the bookshelf trying to decide what to read next when the big bay window exploded. Turning, Harry saw Remus Lupin on Sirius' motorbike. Swallowing past the grief he'd grabbed Draco's hand and they'd both rushed to freedom. 

***

Hermione threw herself into his arms when she saw him. She was crying and saying how sorry she was, how she should have used her brain and not done something "so reckless, oh Harry!" No matter how much he told her it was just as much his fault as hers, she couldn't quite believe him. The rest of the Order was celebrating his retrieval, Ron thumped him on the back and for a brief moment he was back in captivity, and everyone wanted to know what had been done in that cottage ("torture" he'd said, it was after all a kind of torture.) He retreated and joined Draco in the corner of the room, slightly apart from everyone else, watching. It was too much, and too loud, and there were too many people pressing up against him.

Dumbledore approached and tried to speak to Harry alone but the only thing in Harry's head was being pulled away from Draco, away from safety and comfort and laughter, and into danger and terror and pain. So he'd stood a little firmer in position and said that anything Dumbledore wanted to say to him he could say in front of Draco.

The headmaster had been sceptical but then Harry mentioned Draco's choice. 

Which was how they'd learned that all the... artifacts had been destroyed, that plans had been made for an assault on Malfoy Manor where he was based, and that they needed Harry to come with them for the final blow.

Harry very politely refused.

He said that he rather thought the prophecy had been fulfilled, that he was no longer a horcrux (and watched as Dumbledore tried to pretend he hadn't known about that), and that he was still a child thank you very much.

A child that had been through a terrible ordeal and needed to recover, interjected Draco. 

"Excellent manipulation" Harry whispered to Draco as the Order devolved into furious debate and a reworking of plans, causing the other boy to smirk.

If that meant that Dumbledore faced Voldemort with a particularly nasty spell that drew on his life and magic to work, if that meant the Wizarding World mourned the death of one of its greatest defenders, if that meant they forgot about Harry except as a footnote in the pages of history, and if it allowed him to explore the world with Draco before settling in a quiet Scottish village together, then that was perfectly alright with him. He'd had quite enough manipulation, trauma and fame for one lifetime. Now, he wanted to live.

 


End file.
